Monivea bog part of widespread illegal turf cutting, report claims

 By TONY GALVIN A NEW report on the controversial issue of turf cutting on protected bogs has highlighted a major infringement of the law at Monivea bog where Gardai and Wildlife Rangers are monitoring, but not yet taking action to stop, large-scale turf harvesting. The Friends of the Irish Environment (FIE) has published a report entitled â€ËœDefending Ireland's Protected Raised Bogs from Illegal Extraction', which it says shows that at least a third of Ireland's 53 active raised bog sites have been mechanically cut so far this year and 17 of the 22 protected raised bogs surveyed from the air last week by them have been recently cut.[private] FIE has taken aerial photographs of Monivea bog, which shows large-scale harvesting is still taking place there despite the bog's inclusion on the protected list. The group is proposing that the Government uses existing legislation to confiscate hoppers and other machinery being operated on protected bogs and to take out civil injunctions against named individuals which would put them in contempt of court if they were found to be cutting illegally in the future. The group also claim that Gardai are failing to 'address this obstruction of justice' and has criticised Government departments for not identifying illegal cutters. The issue of withholding Single Farm Payment from offenders was also raised in the report. Moylough-based Cllr Michael Connolly told The Herald that he was in sympathy with and supported the Monivea action. He said he agreed with those who said the law being broken was not a just law, and this is why it's being ignored. 'If it was just, then those cutting turf in Monivea and other locations would not have people coming out in their droves to support them,' he told The Herald. Reasonable approach Cllr Connolly added that, in his view, the problem could be solved without costing the taxpayer anything if the National Parks and Wildlife Service would simply sit down and take a reasonable approach to the issue. 'There is room for manoeuvre and most of the protected areas could be preserved with good will. But they are not willing to be flexible and are insisting on nonsensical blanket designations,' he said. He concluded by saying the solution achieved in Mountbellew was not, to his mind, a workable template and left a lot to be desired. In its statement Friends of the Environment said: 'Tellingly, for Ireland's enforcement strategy, over the past month there has been a rapid rise in the number of protected bogs cut. Minister Deenihan told the Dail that â€Ëœto date, there has been one significant incidence of cutting on one protected bog, with more minor incidences on four others.' Only four weeks later, the number of sites has almost quadrupled, some of them extensively cut. Even worse, eight of the 17 sites we found cut this year have in the past received EU funding for bog restoration.'[/private]